Eastern Europe Trip - Page 6 |
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 This
is a Bulgarian Orthodox Church in Sofia, Bulgaria.
I had an interesting experience on the train to Sofia. I believe the train started in Russia and the conductoress was Russian and spoke very little English. She came to my cabin when we were approaching Sofia. She was largish and had big meaty hands. She held my face in her hand and put her mouth near my ear and said "Give to me souvenir". I had a strong inkling of what she really wanted but I played dumb. I said, "what do you want? Like a dollar?" And she repeated her demand "Give to me souvenir". I played dumb until she got tired of me and left. It reminded me of the big bunny that took a fancy to Bugs. I checked with another American on the same car and he had not been asked for a souvenir. |
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 From
Sofia, I headed to the southwest corner of Bulgaria to the little, resort
town of Melnik. It's noted for it's wine. I got there in the off
season. It was snowing and I went for a hike in the hills above
Melnik - that include some chapels and ruins. |
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 I
stayed in a traditional Bulgarian inn and this was the view from the
parking lot. The area in which Melnik is located is all this soft
sandstone. They have carved hundreds of caves into the rocks to
store the wine. You can see some of the caves and also a traditional
Bulgarian Revival house where the people would get together. |
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 These
were the guys I fell in with at the inns restaurant/communal area. I
was already a liter of wine into the night when we started buying drinks
for each other. We had a lot of fun trying to understand each
other. Second to love as an international language is drunkness. |
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